US Politics: Money, Money, Money Makes the World Go Round

[Lollygag]

Just now, The Great Unwashed said:

I'm the one screeching?

I haven't told anyone to fuck off in lieu of actual discussion of the topic.

[Larry of the Lawn]

10 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

I didnt say the party disappeared. And that is an especially odd argument given Sanders isn't a democrat. 

What I said is that it will be taken as a sign that progressives cannot win. That m4a cannot win. You can say it is ridiculous, but this is exactly what has happened every time either party has tried something new and failed. The party then overreacts and goes the other way. 

So, yes, if Sanders loses it will be used against all progressives in the future as evidence they cannot win, and centrists will be given more ammo.

So clearly the smart strategy for any leftist would have been, advocate for John Delaney or Biden or Bloomberg and let moderates fail, in the meantime secretly plot in some basement until the shortest path dictates we actually support someone advocating leftist causes.

I get everyone is trying to set themselves up to not be disappointed.  What I'll ask now, that I've asked a couple other times, is who's the alternative at this point?  What better course of action is there, at this moment, to beat Trump?  Sanders, Bloomberg,and Biden, all die onstage during the next debate?  

A Sanders loss isn't anymore indicative of an m4a loss than Clinton losing meant that people didn't want better healthcare.  Because no matter what people say about what it meant, the healthcare in this country is still fucked and all of us with shitty care, expensive care, or no insurance know it.

And unless I'm missing something the m4a candidate is the most popular person on either side currently running for president.

 

 

[Martell Spy]

18 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

I didnt say the party disappeared. And that is an especially odd argument given Sanders isn't a democrat. 

What I said is that it will be taken as a sign that progressives cannot win. That m4a cannot win. You can say it is ridiculous, but this is exactly what has happened every time either party has tried something new and failed. The party then overreacts and goes the other way. 

So, yes, if Sanders loses it will be used against all progressives in the future as evidence they cannot win, and centrists will be given more ammo.

And when Clinton lost to trump women running for the potus was given a major blow. 

It will certainly be wielded against the left if that comes to pass. That doesn't mean it will necessarily work. The huge defeat of Goldwater led directly to Regananism. The Goldwater crazies inherited the party.

And the left would be crazy not to seize this chance. They have waited decades. Flinching away from a possible defeat and ceding the field also has a pretty high chance of ensuring decades more of moderate Democratic Presidents.

Definitely see the point about this being a really bad time to try this experiment though. It looks like Sanders is winning this fair and square, however. And it says a lot about the other candidates that they can't beat him.

[Zorral]

3 hours ago, Kalbear said:

But the question isn't asking why vote for Sanders. It is asking what happens when he loses. A core understanding from 2016 was that women cant win, and that has affected candidates this time. If the understanding after Sanders loses is that progressives cant win , what does that mean for the future?

You are missing so very much.  What happened after the 2016 HRC catastrophe?  It galvanized women of every sort across the entire nation.  The infestation win energized the left and brought to the left and progressives a whole lot of voters who stayed home back in November 2015.  At least one candidate this time around understands how essential the hispanic vote is and has hired a great consulting team. Bernie, a so called socialist, won very large over all the others, in a state in which there are organized and union labor groups, many of whom happen to be of hispanic descent -- which btw, I predicted would be the case for Bernie.  And whose members are also to great extent women.

What happens if due to voter repression, supression, crazy-ass suffocating and strangling out all other ads and outreach another billionaire determined to buy  what he can't get legitimately in competition with others?  What happens when the crazy ass government money stimulous that bedbug is allowed to pour out into the economy to keep bailing out big agriculture, etc., and the (frozen, factory grown) chicken and pork comes home to roost and contaminate the water table -- and big crash comes down?  What happens? Do you think intelligent people of all walks of life are not thinking of such things?

It called not giving up and living to fight another day. 

In the meantime, the so-called 'centerist base' of the Dem party is NOT THE BASE and it sure as hell ain't energized. They're clutching pearls, wringing hands and BEING MIGHTY SCARED and, per usual, doing nothing but whine.

 

[DMC]

11 minutes ago, larrytheimp said:

Sanders, Bloomberg,and Biden, all die onstage during the next debate?  

Don't start giving me ideas to start a crash-course in voodoo or something.

12 minutes ago, larrytheimp said:

A Sanders loss isn't anymore indicative of an m4a loss than Clinton losing meant that people didn't want better healthcare.

It is when MFA is discernibly unpopular with the general electorate, all other proposals provided by Dem nominees this cycle (or in 2016) are discernibly popular with the general electorate, and Sanders remains the only candidate not willing to compromise on his MFA advocacy.

[Jace, Extat]

6 minutes ago, Zorral said:

You are missing so very much.  What happened after the 2016 HRC catastrophe?  It galvanized women of every sort across the entire nation.  The infestation win energized the left and brought to the left and progressives a whole lot of voters who stayed home back in November 2015.  At least one candidate this time around understands how essential the hispanic vote is and has hired a great consulting team. Bernie, a so called socialist, won very large over all the others, in a state in which there are organized and union labor groups, many of whom happen to be of hispanic descent -- which btw, I predicted would be the case for Bernie.  And whose members are also to great extent women.

What happens if due to voter repression, supression, crazy-ass suffocating and strangling out all other ads and outreach another billionaire determined to buy  what he can't get legitimately in competition with others?  What happens when the crazy ass government money stimulous that bedbug is allowed to pour out into the economy to keep bailing out big agriculture, etc., and the (frozen, factory grown) chicken and pork comes home to roost and contaminate the water table -- and big crash comes down?  What happens? Do you think intelligent people of all walks of life are not thinking of such things?

It called not giving up and living to fight another day. 

In the meantime, the so-called 'centerist base' of the Dem party is NOT THE BASE and it sure as hell ain't energized.

 

All them bitches really helped take back the senate, huh? The one that refused to interview witnesses during impeachment proceedings?

What exactly do you people think Bernard is going to accomplish with a Republican senate? Do you think Mitch McConnel is going to get swept up in the revolution?

 

ETA: Quote, got ninja'd and it wasn't clear who I was raving hysterically at.

[Guest]

49 minutes ago, Lollygag said:

I haven't told anyone to fuck off in lieu of actual discussion of the topic.

Then give me an actual topic to discuss instead of re-hashing tired anti-Sanders tropes.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

1 hour ago, Jaxom 1974 said:

It should have been his last shot in '16.  Probably the same for Biden.  They should have spent the last 4 years working to build a coalition for their views and ideas and put someone to the front of said group and backed them to the hilt.  If it was about the movement and the good that it's supposed to bring about, particularly in Sanders's case, he could have done that.  Instead, he's running out of feels like pure hubris and maybe a tinge of revenge...

Yup. Again, this is hubris, rather than common sense and actual belief in his own message.  If he truly believed in in, not himself, he'd trust someone better suited to enact it.

I don't agree with the spite/hubris/revenge narrative. I think he feared the party was already pulling back to the center, and honestly, it seems he was right. Even Elizabeth Warren shocked me with her insistence on moving towards the center. Not much we can do about it either way. I don't think it's useful for us to look at candidate motivations cynically. Well, except Bloomberg.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

1 hour ago, Raja said:

Man, were the 2016 threads like this one too?

Maybe after Sanders lost the nomination. What you're seeing today is no doubt a building of tension between two groups within the same party that began distinguishing themselves in 2016. 

[Centrist Simon Steele]

1 hour ago, Darzin said:

I think it's a bit more then that, Soviet flag was not just another countries flag like it or not the flag itself is just so ideological, and to quote the great poet @Jace, Basilissa hanging it in your office when you are a forty year old elected official is "some real dumb shit" at that age and position you should damn well know better. But ultimately it's not us Bernie has to convince, we're going to vote for whoever the Democrats put up whether it;s  Bernie Sanders Mike Bloomberg or an epileptic toad; it's the sixty year old machinist in Michigan that needs convincing and  I doubt he's going to read those two paragraphs of context, that's not a knock on you it's a knock on the American voter who won't be able to see the bigger picture that even if Bernie has some flaws Trump is a clear and present danger. But well No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people.

It just isn't a valid argument even in the context of the article you linked. If you want to say clips from 40 years ago could hurt Sanders, fine, I guess they could. But remember, if he's the nom, Trump has decades of bullshit you can run as a counter narrative, including speaking about sexually assaulting women--and doubly including the last four years of his awful Presidency. He has left a paper trail that's so deep, it's been gifted to the Dem nominee. I suppose if we put up a guy who has consistently sided with the working class against a billionaire (maybe not billionaire, no one really knows) who sexually assaults women, and then Americans vote for the Donald, there is little hope for this country that a so-called moderate candidate could hope to deal with.

Also, I have an old soviet flag hanging in my office. I'm forty. I'm also a veteran who served overseas. The flag was an ironic gift from my wife at the time (edit, she is Russian), and I appreciate the irony of it, and no one gives a shit except far right loons who stop lecturing me about patriotism when they find out I'm a veteran. 

[Zorral]

https://katz.substack.com/p/bernie-the-sandinistas-and-americas

To do a Music Man swap out, the howlers about Bernie, Cuba, etc. don't know the territory, they do not know the history.  Or much else either. 

Another good reason so many of us loathe and despise the media and pundits.  They are so often so very very VERY WRONG, yet they persist in their bs.

In the meantime pearl clutchers about Bernie (or Warren or other progressives) manage to terrify themselves with nightmares of what they think they know about these people and what then they WILL DO, turn the US into an authoritarian tyranny with no free press.  What the eff do they think is going on right now with a real authoritarian, who does wet dream himself every night not just about owning the USA but the entire planet? India! Here I come to Rally!

What do they think is going on all over, as the infestation in the WHITE HOUSE has overtly identified himself with Make Russia A Great Czarist Empire Again While We Destroy Democracy Everywhere With the Great Assistance Of Our Trump Stooge Putin -- and they are worried that Sanders and Warren are going to turn the USA into the Soviet Union?

In the meantime, btw, I meet very few people in this country who are actually happy, whereas I meet happy Cubans all the time. 

Not all Cubans are happy, of course, and particularly young Cubans who don't have a path to access to the euros and dollars are downright miserable.  Inequality exists there as well as here, but not always for the same reasons, but that doesn't matter when one is on the receiving side of inequality. And it has demonstrably increased since Trump's minions have increasingly closed US citizens and artists from going to Cuba and bringing Cuban artists here.

[Gorn]

52 minutes ago, Jace, Basilissa said:

All them bitches really helped take back the senate, huh? The one that refused to interview witnesses during impeachment proceedings?

What exactly do you people think Bernard is going to accomplish with a Republican senate? Do you think Mitch McConnel is going to get swept up in the revolution?

 

ETA: Quote, got ninja'd and it wasn't clear who I was raving hysterically at.

If it's plausible to imagine an 80-year old socialist becoming US president, I'd say it's also plausible to imagine a net gain of 4 Senate seats out of 23 that Republicans are defending.

[Lord of Rhinos]

14 minutes ago, Gorn said:

If it's plausible to imagine an 80-year old socialist becoming US president, I'd say it's also plausible to imagine a net gain of 4 Senate seats out of 23 that Republicans are defending.

So how do you see this happening?  Doug Jones is almost certainly going to be losing his seat in Alabama, so Democrats will need to win four seats to get the senate to 50-50.  The three senators that Democrats have a fair chance of knocking out are Susan Collins, Martha McSally, and Cory Gardner, but Dems are going to need one more to reach 50 and like I mentioned earlier if Bernie becomes president they are likely to lose his seat temporarily as well.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

7 minutes ago, Lord of Rhinos said:

So how do you see this happening?  Doug Jones is almost certainly going to be losing his seat in Alabama, so Democrats will need to win four seats to get the senate to 50-50.  The three senators that Democrats have a fair chance of knocking out are Susan Collins, Martha McSally, and Cory Gardner, but Dems are going to need one more to reach 50 and like I mentioned earlier if Bernie becomes president they are likely to lose his seat temporarily as well.

No idea, but I think Graham might be a target. The move from his early never Trumper rhethoric, to his pet lap dog, who sit idly by while his master took crap on his best mate John McCain's grave. That and changing demographics in SC might just be enough to unseat him.

[Guest]

6 minutes ago, Lord of Rhinos said:

So how do you see this happening?  Doug Jones is almost certainly going to be losing his seat in Alabama, so Democrats will need to win four seats to get the senate to 50-50.  The three senators that Democrats have a fair chance of knocking out are Susan Collins, Martha McSally, and Cory Gardner, but Dems are going to need one more to reach 50 and like I mentioned earlier if Bernie becomes president they are likely to lose his seat temporarily as well.

You realize this literally holds true for any of the numerous Senate candidates who ran initially, so it isn't any sort of argument against Sanders, right?

[OnionAhaiReborn]

8 minutes ago, The Great Unwashed said:

You realize this literally holds true for any of the numerous Senate candidates who ran initially, so it isn't any sort of argument against Sanders, right?

I read somewhere that if Sanders resigns his seat before August there will be a special election held on election day to replace him, so his seat would almost certainly be held by a Democrat by the time his term began. Don't know what the case would have been for various other Senators since state laws differ so much. 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

14 minutes ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

No idea, but I think Graham might be a target. The move from his early never Trumper rhethoric, to his pet lap dog, who sit idly by while his master took crap on his best mate John McCain's grave. That and changing demographics in SC might just be enough to unseat him.

I’ve love to see Graham lose but I’ll be very surprised to see him unseated.

[Jace, Extat]

19 minutes ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

No idea, but I think Graham might be a target. The move from his early never Trumper rhethoric, to his pet lap dog, who sit idly by while his master took crap on his best mate John McCain's grave. That and changing demographics in SC might just be enough to unseat him.

Ah, the old Blind Faith Strategy. It's a bold choice, as most famously described by Brian Griffin in his transcendental work Wish It, Want It, Do It

[A Horse Named Stranger]

4 minutes ago, Jace, Basilissa said:

Ah, the old Blind Faith Strategy. It's a bold choice, as most famously described by Brian Griffin in his transcendental work Wish It, Want It, Do It

There goes my next year'S valentine's surprise for you, I hope they take teh Batman and Robin costumes back. The utility belt was full of surprises by the way.

[Jace, Extat]

Valentines day is a great lie invented by the Germans to excuse their involvement in the 1443 War of The American Lovers. 

Wake up!